Early childhood
The best game that really filled my early childhood was GTA Vice City, the OG steal car and roam around, act as a simulator person immersed in Tony's grant adventure of theft
In fact, before this most of my time was spent on playing WWE SmackDown! Here Comes the Pain in PS2 with my brother and close friend. It used to be so fun, to smack and pin down people. In fact I do love WWE for its entertainment factor and character they had in Attitude era (that's for another blog)
Along with this, offline games that crushed my time were, Road Rash, yep kick the police guy and swing the chain and smash it right on the head.
Also Captain Claw was so good, cat and dog chase in such a pirated way, maybe this started my love towards Pirates world (One piece). Captain claw was definitely ahead of its time for sure, even today I find the visuals stunning compared to any mobile games.
Of course I cannot miss mentioning offline games outside in real life. With friends we also used to play cricket in the streets and in ground every day. School sports games weren't much though.
Adulthood
Most of the adulthood drifted towards using social media; Facebook was peak among socializing, Hike was crazy with stickers and there arised the mobile gaming which was at most peak.
As a kid the only game I discovered on android people playing was Subway Surfers and Temple Run, the endless runner that gave the dopamine a game needs to give. And at this time I had limited phone usage and time. Obviously I cannot forget the giant game that was on everyone's phone, Candy Crush Saga, it was just delicious.
Then came the best game for mobile, Clash of Clans, it is the most nostalgic game that I feel even today. The slow base building, and clan socializing with players, constant chat, global chat to show off trophy leagues, war time, attach plans and Barchers attach, using each barbarian and archer to loot and save elixir, watch for efficient times on upgrades and so much more.
Clash of clans definitely felt more immersive to play and connect everyday to progress until TH11. TBH I liked until Th10, but TH11 gave night mare over an eagle for sure. After TH12 I think game went boring in bits and complicated the game. Until TH11 everything felt worth it and had its purpose in game. We friends and neighbors used to build clan, do attacks and discuss every day. Go to popular clan and ask for "Give me Co or else will leave", yes promotion was life achievement there.
Then game the big breakout with clash universe game, Clash Royale, which was easily best strategy game with cards and skills. It even beat out clash of clans in popularity and took over soon with esports scene and more. They had varied cards, various combos and it applied same clash of clans formula of being very immersive. But I wonder if it was supercell greedy or something, both games failed IMO after 2020, as they started complicating or people moved on with life.
In fact, clash royale was best those days, but soon in relaity later turned out be most regret mobile game to have wasted time on. Cause they ruined it so badly into Pay-to-upgrade tier.
Even tho brawl stars is kinda third success to them, I did not like brawl as it soon got complicated with pay to get easy upgrades stuff. Grind was totally bad.
But supercell definitely was the champ among mobile gaming and took over 2016-2020 until they complicated and ruined the games (thanks).
Pandemic
Then came the pandemic and home quarantine, this period started more time towards mobile gaming. Since all friends had to kill time, we eventually came to one game to play, it was Mobile Legends: Bang Bang (MLBB aka Moba Legends 5x5). This was 5v5 MOBA game which had several herous, flashy moves, skills and objective was simply to kill other players and beat the base.
This definitely took most hours player per day, and it was the first time which was totally competitive to play with others. We used to play as team and it was fun to curse, bash, troll and play many games laughing together.
Also there was one of the most beautiful and aesthetic game out there, which was not at all P2W and was the perfect MOBA for mobile, Onmyoji Arena. It had all japanese customs and themed, but thanks to Indian Gov, they banned all NetEase games, and flush it went away.
Obviously there was among us as well for a bit, but due to hype I started it, but not a major part of time occupancy.
Adult
After pandemic and MLBB, I slowly dropped playing any games. Our friends used to play Badminton together in park as beginner and slowly shifted to playing only in Indoor court nowadays (novice -> pro so quick!)
After that there aren't any games that made big impact or occupied tremendous time, all were offline or real life games.
Definitely I missed mentioning many misc games that once player, or simply enjoyed alone. Some of it were:
Detective games, Object finding games, Candy crush or farm saga, many puzzle solving games.
Recently I've been enjoying Honor of Kings the Chinese MOBA giant. Its better than MLBB for sure, but lacks the playerbase worldwide outside china, except that its a solid game with poor matchmaking.
As of writing this, I'm really enjoying Humbug 2 game, this is really fantastic puzzle game. Chill and cozy way to move insects to target.
In case you wonder why no PC games are shown, PC was also used only for limited time. Now that I use Linux, I only have some casual native games here as well.
- Fishdom H2O: Hidden Odyssey - Detect objectives in cozy ocean
- Age of Empires and Age of Mythology (GOAT) - History speaks the strategy
- Need for Speed: Special Edition - The mclaren and the engine noise was bliss
- OpenTTD - FOSS Transport tycoon game
